Family of suburban 9/11 victim takes trip to Guantanamo Bay

Frank and Marion Kminek went to the U.S. Naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, with hopes of looking into the eyes of the five young men accused of helping plan the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that killed their daughter.

They never got to see them. But the trip did open their eyes to a lot of things and led them to change their minds about a hotly debated issue - how and where the terrorists should stand trial.

The Kmineks' 35-year-old daughter, Mari-Rae Sopper, who grew up in Inverness and was a star gymnast at Fremd High School in Palatine, was on the plane that crashed into the Pentagon on 9/11.

A short time later, five of the al-Qaida members who are believed to have helped choreograph the attacks were captured and imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay to await their trial on 2,973 counts of murder, including Sopper's. They're all eligible for the death penalty.

Since thousands of victims' families want to attend the trials, the Pentagon came up with a lottery system that allows 10 people to visit at a time. Five families, with two representatives each, are flown to Cuba in military planes and travel with military escorts around the base and to the courtroom.

Two weeks ago, it was finally the Kmineks' turn.

Marion and Frank Kminek, who moved from West Dundee to Florida a few years ago, planned to sit in on five days of competency hearings for the five men. Instead, they spent only about two hours in the courtroom. The hearing was postponed and the suspects never appeared in court, so the Kmineks returned home after just three days.

"The (al-Qaida members) never came out of their cells," Marion Kminek said.

The Kmineks were seated in a glass-enclosed balcony with four other 9/11 families and a few reporters. The sound was piped into the room on a delay, allowing time to muffle any classified information that might come out during the proceedings, Kminek said.

While they didn't get to see much activity in the courtroom, the experience of being in Guantanamo and talking to people, including the prosecution team, gave the Kmineks a change of heart about how these trials should be handled.

Previously, the Kmineks favored closing Guantanamo and having the al-Qaida members tried in federal court in the United States. They thought the federal courts were in some ways superior and the wheels of justice would turn faster. Now, they think differently.

The Kmineks now believe the prisoners should stay in Guantanamo and should be tried by the military commissions, who already have their cases prepared and are ready to go. To switch it to the federal courts at this point would require rebuilding the cases from scratch, which would add considerable time and expense, they believe.

"My objection is, why would you switch it now, when you have all of the cases put together by the military commissions?" Marion Kminek said.

All of the men reportedly confessed to their roles in the 9/11 plot and want to plead guilty. But in federal court their admissions would be tossed out because the suspects weren't read their Miranda rights. That doesn't upset Marion Kminek, because she was told by the prosecution team that the suspects were still advised of their right not to speak before they made their statements.

"I don't think it's fair to the prisoners to wait another two years. That's kind of a weird position to take. They want to plead guilty. Let them plead guilty!" she said.

When they got home from Cuba Sept. 28, the Kmineks sent a letter to President Barack Obama, arguing their points.

Shortly after Obama took office, he announced plans to close Guantanamo, criticized for its harsh interrogation methods, by January 2010. Since then, Congress has complicated that process.

Last week, the House passed a nonbinding recommendation to ban the 245 Guantanamo detainees from being transferred to the U.S for any reason, including a trial. On Wednesday, a House-Senate compromise was reached that would allow the terrorist suspects to be on U.S. soil during their trials.

So the question still remains to be seen where, and how, justice will be carried out.

While Marion Kminek is anxious for the trials to begin, she doesn't have hateful feelings toward the al-Qaida members. She believes they're not evil people - just religious extremists on a misguided mission.

She opposes the death penalty, a belief she held long before 9/11. And she's glad that any statements obtained using torture are inadmissible as evidence in either a military commission or a federal court.

Kminek says she wants these men to have a fair trial, and if they're guilty, to be punished.

"I want them locked up for the rest of their lives, because they want death. They want to be martyrs," she said.

Kminek's opinion is probably the same as her daughter's would have been, she believes. As a military defense attorney in the U.S. Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps (better known as JAG), Mari-Rae believed strongly in fairness and compassion.

"She might have been defending (these suspects)," Kminek joked. "She would have given them the best defense, because that's the way it's supposed to be in the court system. It's a system, and you have to let the system work. If you don't give them a good defense, they've got an 'out' later on."

• Daily Herald news services contributed to this report.